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Charlton’s United record had stood since his retirement in 1973. Charlton, now a director at Old Trafford, presented Rooney with a trophy to commemorate his record-breaking achievement. Ironically, that salute came before Rooney’s last starting appearance at Old Trafford against Wigan.

Remarkably, United will be able to claw back the £27million they paid Everton for Rooney back in 2004, with Chinese clubs willing to pay around £30m to lure him.

Rooney after being signed by Sir Alex Ferguson (Image: John Peters)

Rooney will be able to command a weekly salary in the region of £750,000-a-week in the Far East, which is more than double his current salary at United.

Mourinho acknowledged United’s improvement this season without Rooney in the starting line-up, despite the forward only having returned to training yesterday after injury.

“Rooney is injured and has been injured for two or three weeks,” said Mourinho. “I cannot do miracles at that level.

“When you don’t have a player, you have others. The team is in a good moment.

“In the past four months we lost only one game, and we lost a game we could lose, because it was a two-legged match for the League Cup.

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The forward will do all he can to ensure he is fit and can claim a place among Mourinho’s subs, with the United boss said to be willing to hand his skipper the farewell he craves.

Rooney, who has started one of United’s last nine games, trained yesterday for the first time in three weeks, with Mourinho giving a frank assessment of his skipper’s current predicament.

Rooney is set to move to China (Image: Triple S Sports & Entertainment Group / YouTube)

“When the training session was high in intensity, he wasn’t training, so no chance for tomorrow, he’s not here,” said Mourinho.

“So he stayed back for training and let’s see for the weekend.”

Opinion will be divided among United fans over Rooney’s imminent departure. Those who idolise him will be sad to see him go, while a section of United’s fans cannot forgive him for twice threatening to leave the club.

The first time, in October 2010, when Rooney questioned United’s ambition in an unseemly public spat with the club and insisted he would leave when his current deal expired, the saga ended with him signing a lucrative new five-year deal.

When Ferguson stepped down in 2013, having secured his 13th Premier League title, he claimed Rooney had handed in a transfer request that had been rejected, with his successor David Moyes resisting Chelsea’s attempts to sign him. Jose Mourinho was the Chelsea boss at the time.